New Treatment Gives Heart Patient a Fresh Start

For years, Nolan Shoots lived on edge. The 71-year-old resident of Trenton, Missouri, knew the feeling: a sudden tightening in his chest and a moment of fear before his implantable defibrillator delivered a small shock to correct his dangerous heart rhythm.  

“Over time, all those shocks start to weigh on you,” he says.  

A history of heart disease

Nolan has lived with heart disease for decades. At 42, a heart attack led him to a triple bypass surgery at Saint Luke’s Mid America Heart Institute, and he’s been under the care of our nationally renowned team of heart experts ever since. Years after his heart attack, Nolan developed ventricular tachycardia, a life-threatening condition where the heart beats too quickly and causes dizziness, chest pain, and cardiac arrest. He was given an implantable defibrillator to detect abnormal heart rhythms and shock his heart back into sync, but the frequency of these episodes left him distressed and unable to live a normal life.  

Over the years, Nolan worked with his cardiology team to explore different treatment options, but nothing was working. By fall 2025, Sanjaya Gupta, MD, a board-certified and fellowship-trained cardiac electrophysiologist, started thinking outside the box.  

“When I met Nolan, he had exhausted all the traditional treatments for someone with his condition,” Dr. Gupta says. “He had been through two ablations, surgery to remove the nerves affecting his heart rhythm, and multiple medications. However, he was not in heart failure, so he was not a candidate for a heart transplant. It was time to start thinking about more novel treatments.”

A different approach

Dr. Gupta and his team identified a potential option: stereotactic body radiation therapy (SBRT), a highly focused form of radiation therapy traditionally used to treat cancer. In recent years, it has emerged as a treatment for patients with severe ventricular tachycardia, like Nolan. A minimally invasive procedure, SBRT uses a focused beam of radiation to target the area of heart tissue responsible for triggering abnormal heart rhythms and create small lesions that block the tissues’ ability to send faulty signals.  

“SBRT allows us to treat areas of heart tissue that are inaccessible or difficult to access via surgery,” Dr. Gupta says. “At the time, Saint Luke’s did not offer SBRT, but after explaining it to Nolan, he was interested in pursuing the treatment as our first patient.”  

The concept was promising, but its implementation would take time.  

Over the next several months, Saint Luke’s teams across cardiology, electrophysiology, and radiation oncology collaborated to build procedures and protocols for SBRT treatments. They reviewed national literature, consulted with other centers, procured equipment, and secured legal approvals.  

“Offering a treatment like SBRT required coordination at every level,” Dr. Gupta says. “It is both inspiring and humbling to see how many people came together for a single patient.”  

A long-awaited breakthrough

In January 2026, Nolan arrived at Saint Luke’s Hospital of Kansas City with nervous anticipation. He found comfort in the quiet moments before surgery. “I did a lot of praying,” Nolan says. “And it helped to know that family and friends were praying for me, too.”  

Over the course of three hours, Dr. Gupta worked through every detail of the procedure to ensure it went as planned with no complications. “Dr. Gupta wanted to get it right,” Nolan says. “I really appreciated his attention to detail.”  

The procedure was a success, marking not only a triumph of teamwork—but also a turning point in Nolan’s care. He went home that day with something he hadn’t felt in years: hope.  

A fresh start

Today, Nolan feels better than he has in years. After years of reduced mobility, he’s working to rebuild his strength and get back to a normal life. “A lot of the recovery is in your attitude,” Nolan says. “Now that I’ve had this treatment, I have the motivation to get out there and do things again.”  

Although the treatment was successful for Nolan, he says it wasn’t the driving force behind his decision. “To me, it was worth it to potentially help someone else down the road,” he says.

After years of shocks and setbacks, Nolan finds himself immensely grateful for the care that he received, the community that supported him—and the team that never gave up on him.  

“Saint Luke’s was fantastic,” Nolan says. “Dr. Gupta, the radiologists, the nurses—everyone I met treated me like a VIP every step of the way.”  

About Saint Luke’s Mid America Heart Institute  

Comprising nearly 100 board-certified experts in cardiology, cardiovascular surgery, and critical care anesthesia, Saint Luke’s Mid America Heart Institute offers a comprehensive range of treatment options for advanced heart failure, structural intervention, preventive cardiology, electrophysiology, and heart and vascular surgery. Learn more about the Heart Institute.